Chapter 1
“When is Dad coming home?” Cori asked.
Hope looked across the kitchen to where her thirteen-year-old daughter sat at the table working on a Sudoku puzzle and waiting for the spaghetti her mother had not yet put together. The sauce was simmering, but Hope was reluctant to start boiling the noodles until she heard from her husband, Doug.
As a reporter, Doug’s job sometimes took him far from Columbus. His current crusade was against a drug gang that imported and sold fentanyl. As her husband had explained, the gang had a lot of cash that they used to buy dirty local police and politicians who would look the other way.
Doug, like the bloodhound he was, had sniffed out the corruption and chased the trail. He didn’t worry much about the danger. He always shrugged it off. Most of the thugs and officials he dealt with talked a tough game, but rarely acted on their threats since going to prison for taking a bribe was nothing compared to going to prison for murder.
Hope glanced at her watch. Her husband wasn’t that late, in fact, he wasn’t really late at all. She’d hold off on the noodles until he called or texted because he always called or texted.
“He’ll be home in a little bit,” Hope told Cori. “He’s working.”
“He’s always working.” Cori frowned. “He’s supposed to help me with my science project.”
“I can help you with it,” Hope offered.
“Like you did last year?” Cori giggled. “It exploded, remember?”
Hope did remember. The explosion was spectacular, only it wasn’t supposed to happen. She didn’t want to take credit for the explosion, but it really was her fault. Of course, that was the chance Cori took when she asked her mother, the social studies teacher, to help on a science project.
“That was a simple mistake of adding too much baking soda.” The corners of Hope’s mouth turned up. “I misread the instructions.”
“And that’s why I’ll wait for Dad,” Cori said with a big grin.
Hope couldn’t fault her daughter’s logic. Why trust mom, when dad was a seriously better scientist?
“Would you watch the sauce pot?” Hope asked. “It’s simmering. Turn it down if it starts to sputter.”
“All right.” Cori was working on a math problem.
“I’m going to grade some tests in my office. When Dad gets home, come get me.”
“Yep.”
Hope retreated to her first-floor office, which used to be a den. Doug’s office was on the second floor in the small bedroom. They knew it was better that they didn’t share a space.
Hope’s office smelled of lilac and featured two large windows that let in the sunlight, even in the dead of winter. Doug had put a large white board partially over his window, sending the room into near twilight, even on bright days. Her shelves were filled with neatly arranged books and binders. His shelves were stuffed with manuscripts and half-read books, in no particular order. Her desk featured a docking station, so she could use her laptop wherever she was in the house. Doug’s old, steel desk held up an old-fashioned desktop computer. He had a laptop, but only used it when he was out. He was always transferring files via Internet or flash drive. Hope knew that she could never work in a space filled with Doug’s lack of organization so separate offices were the solution.
Hope didn’t bother sitting at the desk. She pulled her shoulder-length brown hair into a messy bun, then plopped into the overstuffed chair, her folder of tests on the table next to her. She opened the file and took out the first answer sheet with the name Brady Schnurr written on the top of the paper.
Brady wasn’t the smartest boy in the class, but he wasn’t the least capable either. Hope guessed Brady would score somewhere in the 80s, right on the cusp between a ‘B’ and a ‘C.’ Since this wasn’t an essay test, Hope couldn’t fudge in any direction. The number spoke for itself. The test took less than five minutes to grade. She wrote 87 at the top and added a little note—well done. Brady and his parents would be satisfied with the grade. The young man was a solid middle-of-the-class student.
Hope worked through the tests expecting at any moment to be summoned to the kitchen. At five minutes per test, she could correct the entire class in less than two hours. If she skipped some personal notes, she could finish even faster, but she liked to add positive comments. A bit of encouragement or a frank assessment of a problem might be all a student needed to do better. She didn’t have to finish grading all of the tests because her first period the next day was a planning period. She could finish the grading then if she needed to.
Hope had graded a dozen tests before she decided to see if Doug had arrived home. She checked her phone, but there was still no message from him.
A flicker of worry ran through her body. It was odd that Doug hadn’t contacted her.
She went into the kitchen where Cori was busy with her tablet computer. Lots of the kids had tablets since they were simple to use and easy to carry.
“Did your father text you?” Hope asked.
“Nope,” Cori answered as she absent-mindedly twisted a strand of her long brown hair.
Hope looked at the clock. “Well, too bad for him. I’m hungry. We’re eating dinner.”
“It’s about time,” Cori agreed. “I’m starving.”
“Would you set the table for us?” Hope asked.
“For two or three?”
“Three, but you know what is going to happen,” Hope said with a smile. “Once we get all the work done, he’ll come through the door.”
“He’s good at that,” Cori said shaking her head.
“Very good.”
It was fifteen minutes before Hope sat down with a plate of spaghetti and a salad. Cori dove into the salad while looking at her tablet.
“Ahem,” Hope said. “Tablet.”
Cori looked up, and Hope shook her head.
With a little groan, Cori put aside the tablet and kept eating.
Hope said. “This is our dinner hour, our time to chat.”
“Why do you always want to chat?” Cori asked lifting a forkful of salad from her plate.
“Because dinner talk is fast becoming a lost art. People don’t take the time and effort to engage with each other. Now, it’s just wolf down your food while staring at your phone or computer screen. People aren’t robots. We need to interact, and dinner is the perfect time to talk about our days. Tell me what you learned in school today.”
Cori frowned. “Do I have to?”
“No, we can talk about your last math test, if you’d rather do that.”
“Am I still paying for that? Don’t you forget anything?”
“What did you learn in school today?” Hope tried to get some chat going.
“I learned that climate change is happening fast and we only have a few years to change things. The climate is always changing, and it’s been warmer than in the past, and colder, too.”
They talked about ways that could slow climate change and then Hope asked, “What else did you learn?”
Hope liked to talk to her daughter about her day in school. Not only did Cori learn polite dinner chat, but the talking kept Cori from scarfing down her food and running off to her room. Slowing down the dinner process was a good thing, in Hope’s opinion. Cori was getting older and, too often, they were finished in ten minutes and that was hardly any time to connect with each other.
As they talked, Hope kept looking at the clock and to the back door. The clock told her Doug was very late. The back door should have opened by now. Doug should be smiling at them and recounting some funny anecdote about a farmer around Dayton or a pawn shop operator in Cleveland. Doug was a very good storyteller and Hope and Cori loved to hear his tales. Hope wished he was right there in the kitchen with them making them laugh.
Chapter 2
Although the clock moved, the door stayed closed. They finished dinner and clean up, and Cori retreated to the living room to finish her homework. Hope fixed a plate for Doug and slid it into the fridge, and then she went back to her office to finish grading the tests. After that, she’d lay out her clothes for the next day. Hope had a tidy streak in her. Doug, on the other hand, wasn’t as neat, although, his work files were impeccable. He tracked everything about a story, writing out copious notes. She always wondered how he could be so detail-oriented about one thing and not another.
By the time Hope had laid out her outfit for the next day and packed up her briefcase, she’d started to worry. It wasn’t that Doug couldn’t get waylaid by a breaking story. That happened once in a while.
What bothered her was that he hadn’t checked in with her. That was unusual, very unusual, so she did what she rarely ever did when he was working. She called him.
And was greeted by his voicemail.
“All right,” Hope said trying to keep the worry out of her voice. “You’re late, so please call and let us know what’s up. Let me know you’re okay. Love you.” When she clicked off the phone, alarm bells rang in her head.
Hope really started to worry when it was time for Cori to go to bed, but she tried hard to push away her feelings of unease. When Doug did arrive, he would have a perfectly legitimate explanation. It was always like that. Hope tried to convince herself she was worrying for nothing.
“Where’s Dad?” Cori asked as she hugged her mother goodnight.
“Out doing his job,” Hope said.
“But he always calls,” Cori said. “He didn’t call tonight.”
“He almost always calls, and I’m sure he has a good reason why he hasn’t.”
“Like what?”
“He lost his phone, or his phone ran out of power, or he’s stuck some place where he can’t get a signal, or there’s a breaking story. There are lots of reasons why he can’t call us.”
“You don’t think something bad happened to him, do you?” Cori’s voice held a tinge of worry.
“No, no, nothing bad, nothing bad at all. It’s just one of those things. You know, like when you forget to take your phone to school.”
“I only did that twice.”
“And both times, you needed to make a call and couldn’t.”
“Okay, I get it.”
Hope kissed her daughter on the forehead. “Dad will be home soon, and he’ll kiss you good night when he gets in.”
“Promise?”
“Promise. Now, go have a good sleep.”
“Good night, Mom.”
Hope turned off the light and closed the door. She was pretty sure Cori wouldn’t go right to sleep. Her daughter worried at times, especially about her father. Hope wondered just when that had started. She couldn’t pinpoint an exact day, but it might have been when Doug spent three weeks in Boston, investigating a city councilman whose business partner and wife were found murdered. While Doug had called home every day, his absence made Cori anxious. Well, Hope had to admit that his absence made her anxious too, and maybe, her worry had bled over to Cori.
Hope locked the doors and grabbed a book from the bookcase, a mystery, which was her favorite kind of story. She liked to think she would have been a good detective. She had that sort of mind. Means, motive, and opportunity. Red herrings. The citizen detective, all the tropes of the genre. She liked stretching her brain to solve the murder and she was a very good researcher. Once in a while, she got fooled when reading a story, but she had learned the steps of the plots, the gradual build, the unexpected witness. She would have made a very good law enforcement officer.
She settled into her chair and opened the book. While a small voice nagged at her, reminding her that Doug hadn’t called, she pushed the voice to the side. She would read until it was her bedtime. The last thing she was going to do was worry herself sick. She had to keep her mind busy so she wouldn’t dwell on what might be wrong.
Hope had only read a few pages when outside lights splashed across the wall, the red and blue lights of some sort of emergency vehicle. With her heart hammering, she went to the window and looked out. A state police cruiser was in their driveway, the lights flashing.
Hope put her hand against the wall and bit her lip as her vision seemed to swim.
When the doorbell rang, she could barely take a breath.
Hope hurried to the front door. She looked through the peep hole at the state trooper, his Mountie hat on his head, and with tears gathering in the corner of her eyes, she opened the door hoping the officer was at the wrong house.
A serious-faced man looked at her.
“Who is it?” Cori asked.
Hope turned around. Her daughter stood behind her.
Hope said, “It’s a policeman.”
“Oh, no. Oh, no.” Cori gripped onto her mother’s arm.
With gathering dread, Hope looked back at the trooper.
“Hope Herring?” the trooper asked.
“Yes,” she answered, her voice barely above a whisper.
“May I come in for a moment, Ma’am?”
“Oh, yes, sorry. I … I don’t know….”
She opened the door wider and stepped back to let the officer in, and after that, she didn’t remember much of anything.
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